People Are Doing Karaoke Wrong
Summary
Karaoke is broken, and this rider knows exactly why. People aren't reading the room. They're singing seven-minute Celine Dion ballads while everyone escapes for a smoke break instead of picking crowd-pleasers that get the whole bar moving. Kareem's guest has strong opinions about selfish song choices like "Bohemian Rhapsody" and champions one simple philosophy: you've got three minutes to make everyone dance, so use them wisely. Her go-to? "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" every single time. If people are heading to the bathroom during your performance, you're ruining the night.
Full Transcript
So what's your take? I think we are doing karaoke wrong.
What are we doing wrong? People just aren't reading the room. They aren't reading the room. They're doing the song that they want to do and not the song that the listeners want to hear. Yeah, you have 3 minutes to make sure that everyone's up and dancing having a good time. So pick a song that's going to get everyone hyped. So no sad songs. If your idea of getting everyone up and dancing is singing, uh, "It's All Coming Back to Me Now" by Celine Dion, then you need to do jail time. That song is seven minutes long and I think they're doing it on purpose. Do I do "Bohemian Rhapsody" today? Oh, but I'm good. I think it's selfish. I think that people should—selfish. I think it's borderline selfish.
What's your song? "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" every single time. I sing it, everyone's up. Everyone's up. They just wanna—they just wanna see you already want to dance. You already want to dance. I think if you ever do go to karaoke and you start singing and people use that time to go and have a smoke break, go to the bathroom, go get more drinks, you are ruining the night.